Field of the Disclosure
The following is directed to abrasive articles, and more particularly bonded abrasive articles.
Description of the Related Art
In the production of electronic devices, the back surface of a semiconductor wafer having a plurality of circuits such as IC's and LSI's is ground to a predetermined thickness by a grinding machine before it is divided into individual chips. To grind the back surface of the semiconductor wafer efficiently, a grinding machine equipped with a rough grinding unit and a finish grinding unit is generally used. Generally, the article utilize to conduct the rough grinding process is a bonded abrasive body or bond grindstone, which is obtained by bonding together diamond abrasive grains having a relatively large size with a vitrified bond or metal bond material. A resin bond grindstone having diamond abrasive grains of a median particle size of 2 microns or more contained in a resin bond is typically used for finish grinding operations. Smaller sizes of diamonds generally cannot be utilized in resin bonded articles.
The idea of high-porosity grindstones has been disclosed, but it is recognized by those of skill in the art that the creation of grindstones having such high porosities remains a challenge and there appear to be practical limitations on the formation of grindstones having porosities in excess of 90 vol %. Still, the industry continues to demand improved grindstone materials, capable of achieving improved grinding performance.